August 2015

08/26/2015

Olive starts kindergarten today, at our neighborhood school, where I work as a counselor.

I told Nick last night, "I'm a little emotional tonight because I won't be able to be tomorrow."

I'll be the one in the hallway helping other people's children cross the threshold of public education, of eight-hour days away from family-- and my baby is crossing that same line.

"I'm a little bit scared," Olive said when I tucked her in bed.

"Everyone is who starts school, Sweetie. We all feel that way when we start something new."

And sure she's been attending full-day preschool since she turned three but there's something different about kindergarten.

Its mandatory.

Its the beginning of homework and tests and my child in a roomfull of others compared along a spectrum of success.

"You'll see me at recess. Recess is when you get to go outside and play."

"I may not want to play. I may just want to be with you. For the first day."

"You can come give me a hug if you want, but I bet you'll want to play." I joined Olive in her bed and for the first time in awhile, didn't want to rush out of her room for adult only time.

I know Olive is ready but am I?

I'm nervous about all the hidden and not-so-hidden rules and social norms Olive will learn in school, the social hierarchy of children and the violent images that children living in poverty hold.

Over 80% of the kids at our school live beneath the poverty line. Most of the families that live in my part of the zone choose charter or optional schools instead of Airport Heights. I understand their desire to give their kids an alternative educational experience, I get it, and I see the injustice this system does to the kids and schools left in their wake.

So my family chooses to walk around the corner to our neighborhood school instead of driving our children across town.

It helps that I work there.

And yet none of this is helping me this morning as I anticipate Olive in her new purple dress walking into room 12 for her first day at Airport Heights. I may need a moment in my office, with the door shut, as Mom, before I can face all the other families as Counselor.

School:

After School:

Olive walked easily into room 12 this morning. I hung in the hallway for a moment before walking to the main office to share my "Words of Wisdom" as part of our morning announcement. When I said, "With something to think about this is Ms Christy..." I thought of Olive sitting at her blue table hearing her Mom's voice over the loud speaker.

I walked past her room afterwards and saw her sitting upright with play-dough in her hands. She glanced at me, her eyes lit up, but she quickly turned back towards her teacher.

On my third attempt to walk past and peek in the room another kindergarten teacher beckoned me to her room and I introduced myself to a 5-year-old girl standing apart from her peers, crying in the corner, my Counselor Hat firmly back on my head.

The morning flew past and next thing I knew I stood outside waiting for the kindergarteners to emerge from the building for recess.

When they finally made it out from lunch, missing at least ten minutes of their 20-minutes of outdoor time, Olive ran right past me to play amongst the birch trees. She rolled a tire across the grass and tried balancing on our new slack lines. She waited in line for the one tire swing and when the bell rang she sprinted to the cone and claimed the front of the line.

As I watched her stand still and tall, eyes focused forward, in line at the third most diverse elementary school in the nation based on the even distribution of our students: Hmong, Samoan, Alaska Native, Hispanic, Philippino, African American, Caucasian, I saw something else she can only learn at a place like this: Acceptance and compassion.

"I like kindergarten," Olive told me tonight.

"I'm so glad." We sat on the couch reading her parent newsletter together.

"Did you know your bandaids falling off your elbow?"

"That's OK. I'm better."

I kiss her on the head.

"Mom, I'm going to put some bandaids in my backpack to bring to school, so if someone gets hurt I can help them."

08/23/2015

I sit in the sun, in Seward, on this lazy Sunday, body sore from Saturday's Lost Lake mountain race.

Nick and I ran 15.7 miles, up through the trees, to the tundra, on a path that weaves around clear blue pools of water, from small to large, tucked between peaks that reach for the heavens.

800 of us ran in waves along a single track trail to raise money for Cystic Fibrosis, with every half-mile marked by pictures of children affected by the disease. When I wasn't focused on my footing, trying not to trip over roots and rocks, I'd read the sign and repeat the child's name as my mantra to keep running.

"Are you ready?" a man asked before the race, as Nick and I stretched on the rocky beach of Kenai Lake at the Primrose campground.

"I guess so," I replied. "I just keep thinking how lucky I am to spend such a beautiful day moving."

"That's it, isn't it," he smiled.

And now here I am, the day after, race completed, injury-free, with Nick and I crossing the finish line holding hands. Proud that our bodies held up, even if my knees screamed at me during the decent, shocked that I expected them to keep going.

And the sun still shines.

And I'm here in Seward, on this land that I love, without my children calling my name, free to write in my notebook, no need to respond.

I needed this. To push my body harder than normal and now, to just be still.

Especially after the stress of the past two weeks, between Camp Fire's decision to no longer accommodate Elias's needs, to returning to work at a school that is under construction, bringing with it a whole new whirlwind of safety issues and concerns, and then the first day of 6th grade for my son who stands out in his class of typical kids, with his pull-ups and canes and repetitive comments that make noses scrunch and eyebrows raise.

The night before school started, I came home from our in-service a bundle of nerves, dashing around the house completing concrete tasks with a beginning and an end, like putting clean sheets on our bed, folding the corners just so, like I learned as a "Chamber Maid" (yes, that was my title) all those years ago. With half our school building blocked off as a construction zone, no cafeteria, no gym, no playground, ten relocatable buildings to house all the older grades (Elias's the farthest from the school), I just couldn't wrap my head around all our hopeful fragile students, my own boy amongst them, arriving the next day to go to school.

What would happen when the bell rang?

And now its Sunday, three school days down, and yes, I still hold a head-full of questions and concerns, but children are nothing if not adaptable and they seemed to enjoy walking from their relos to the building to pick up lunches from a classroom converted into a kitchen. Instead of playground equipment we played in the trees with truck tires and ropes-- the kids created their own challenges and games. And Elias walked eagerly to class at that first bell and came out smiling when the last bell chimed.

Losing Camp Fire forced us to research other opportunities and Elias seems genuinely excited to attend a new after school program for 6th through 8th-graders with special needs, one that will pick him up at Airport Heights and drive him home.

(Assuming the state passes our new Plan of Care, a process that can take up to 45 days. Fingers crossed.)

He'll spend his mornings in my office. When Nick told him this plan he presented it as a sign of Elias's maturity and amazingly Elias accepted this change of schedule with ease.

I know a thousand stresses still lay ahead, but right now, the sun is shining and all I see is blue sky and trees, Hemlock and Spruce, taller than the worries I hold, green giants, solid in their place.

These trees know nothing about the children on those mile markers and the families who love them, they do not worry about the school year and the myriad of issues that arrive each fall, they just stand tall, like beacons of hope to keep on growing, no matter what the wind blows your way.

08/13/2015

I imagined returning from my writing hiatus and telling you about dancing in the dirt at Salmonfest, or catching 50 Sockeye on the shores of the Kenai with our hippo-sized nets, or making a giant nest out of Alder and Spruce on our land above Resurrection Bay, as we work towards clearing a space for a home on the edge of mountains and sea...

But I got a phone call that changed all that.

"...so I wanted to talk about Elias's plan of care for the year..."

BANG.

From slow easy breathing, fueled by a salty breeze, to nails all peeled as I try to piece together an alternative before and after-school plan.

It seems Camp Fire can no longer serve Elias due to his complex needs, this after five-years of continuity and saving grace.

"I don't want to go to school..."

"But then you won't get to go to Camp Fire and see Ms. Myrna..."

Ah, but Ms. Myrna retired. An event that's been publicized (and dreaded) for over a year.

("Can't you just wait till Elias finishes sixth grade. I'll pay you extra, just kidding, but really, I mean, could you...?")

During this phone call, I learn the new site director doesn't come with the same skills as Myrna to work with Elias; the administrator tells me Myrna had been operating outside of their general policies, which they can't now change to accommodate my son.

And why didn't this conversation happen last Spring, when I celebrated the retirement of our beloved Ms. Myrna, and registered Elias with Camp Fire for the 2015-2016 school year?

Every year I submit his Plan of Care to the main office. Every year I describe in detail all of his needs.

I hide nothing.

Why now? In August? When my time is no longer mine? With only mere days left of summer to develop a plan B?

Bullshit.

This is how it goes as the parent of a child with special needs.

Just when you think you have a plan to make it through, something changes, and you find yourself in front of a computer, or with a pile of papers scattered across the kitchen table, or both, writing about all his issues for the thousandth time, so you can try to get some level of assistance, and you feel torn to pieces wondering why you have to describe all the hardships in letters that limit the child you can't define, and if you are asking too much for others to accept him based on the deficits you describe.